Eight parents that should be neutered and shot into the sun

I’m busy this evening, working on the script for tomorrow night’s episode of Dreamland Tonight, but I wanted to share this horrible video nightmare that was just sent to me by someone who obviously wanted to trigger one of my famous, life-shortening panic attacks.

Call me a prude, but I’ve got an issue with parents that dress their third-graders up like whores and push them out on a stage to simulate sex acts. Maybe I’m showing my age when I say this, but, back in the day, our child prostitutes at least showed a little class.

And, yeah, I get that it’s a free country, and that the girls are talented dancers, but can’t our culture do better? I’m not suggesting that we go all Taliban on these kids, and remove their heads in a soccer field. I don’t think they’re to blame. It’s the parents, in my opinion, that should be herded up and launched screaming into the sun.

Do you want to know my worst fear… It’s that something happens to me, like I go into a coma, and I can’t stop something like this from happening to my daughter… I can’t stand the thought of her, instead of working hard to realize her potential as a human being, choosing to focus on inconsequential bullshit, like how fast she can raise and lower her ass.

Ok, so this particular example is clearly way over-sexualized which I blame heavily on the costumes, but I danced for 18 years growing up and did routines not too much unlike this one. I really don’t feel messed up from it. It was competitive & physically demanding & I don’t think it was inconsequential any more than team sports are, which is a whole other conversation I suppose.

Anyway, this video specifically makes me wince, but really it’s more the fault of some probably trampy 21 year old dance teacher than it is the parents.

I will say that, apart from the costumes, the dances themselves are pretty standard African inspired Hip-hop moves. They really aren’t much different from moves that you see people of all ages doing in countries like Malawi, although this is much more strictly choreographed.

One has to wonder if people would have the same reaction if it were a bunch of African kids doing the same routines and if the shock is merely age old worries of sexualized black culture infiltrating the innocence of our pure white daughters.

I have to kinda agree with Peter. I watched this with no sound, and old jazz playing in the background, and it didn’t seem that bad. I think the costumes are what make it kind of dirty.
It looks like The Pussycat Dolls had a litter of kittens. Put them in some of those ugly 80’s leotard dance suits and it would be a little more tame…

Actually, it’s not *just* the parents we should shoot into the sun. It’s the dance instructor. You know, the person the parents sent their kids to every week that collected payment to teach this age-inappropriate routine to these girls?

Well Emma, you go right ahead and think that, and I’ll get right back to teaching my daughter to stay away from over-sexualized society and use her brain for good and her body to do something a bit more tasteful. By the way, I didn’t say it was sexy, the outfits and moves imply enough without me making that judgement. If you can’t see that, than you must be under 18, stupid or both, and you can’t fix stupid.

Geez, a week later and I’m still thinking about this. Mark, I think you need to rethink this. You’re basically slut-shaming a group of young girls for using their hips when they dance and for wearing the equivalent of 2 piece bathing suits with ruffles. I admit when I first watched it, it made me gasp but mostly because it’s so darn frenetic. Then I saw one of the girl’s parents this morning on Good Morning America and from the reaction of George Snuffleupagaus, you’d think this was child porn. It’s not. I agree with Emma. I’m not accusing you of being a pedo (you’re not) but people are projecting their shit onto these girls who were just dancing. I used to bellydance and I know there are young girls getting into bellydance. I can assure you that when they’re shimmying and doing articulations with their hips, they’re not trying to turn anyone on. They’re thinking about their technique and enjoying seeing what their bodies are capable of doing. They can’t help it if some people think hips moving is sexy. Watch these and tell me, would you condemn these parents too? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gggHppFvt7A&feature=relatedhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6rhkOvOidI&feature=related